Re: [ox-en] Interview with Peter Lamborn Wilson
- From: "Niall Douglas" <s_fsfeurope2 nedprod.com>
- Date: Sat, 31 Jul 2004 22:55:28 +0100
On 31 Jul 2004 at 21:10, Robin Green wrote:
Do you think there is some connection between free events like Burning
Man, and mass protests like those against the G8 / IMF / World Bank
etc.?
If one views all technology and usage of technology as extensions of
the human mind and body, then it becomes clear that we are no more
trapped by technology than technology is trapped by us. In other
words, it's a tight feedback loop which society chooses to be inside
because it prefers it that way.
Now /why/ it prefers it that way can be blamed on shadowy groups
behind the scenes if you like, but that's being simplistic. Right
now, we as a population are still too immature to realise that too
much material wealth is soul destroying - some is good, indeed it is
necessary - but too much is just as bad as too little, even if the
bad consequences aren't are obvious to the untrained eye.
What I do see is that technology, like all technology enables new
things previously unseen. For example, the atomic bomb enabled the
end of war in Europe, something unknown for any 50 year period in the
last few thousand. Many blame omnipresent TV for a whole pile of bad
things and they're right - but they conveniently forget all the good
things it also brought. If society didn't like TV, they'd get rid of
it and they must like it for a reason.
In general, it can be shown that a population over long periods of
time stops doing bad things for itself. For example, when everyone
was starving the goal was to be fat - when everyone has too much
food, suddenly the goal becomes to be thin. Capitalism, like all
sustainable economic systems, is far more a function of a
population's cognition than any innate workings of nature and it is
inevitable that there is money to be made in greasing the wheels of
that cognitive network. Initially it was writing, then books, then
printed books, then the postal service, then etc etc etc. The
internet and mobile phones is merely the latest in that sequence.
You can either accept the inevitability of this and concentrate on
things you can actually change, or disparage everything new and stick
your head in the sand. I notice there is an increasing tendency to do
the latter with age.
"I strongly recommend simply buying a Linux tshirt, telling everyone
how good Linux is and continuing to use Windows. All of the effect
without the danger." -- Daniel Davies
Hmm. Your misquoting of me still litters google searches for my name
and probably will forever. I would far prefer if you are to quote
people to also have a link to an archived messages from which you
took the quote so people aren't made out to look like idiots. OTOH,
it could be worse, your misquotes of me don't exceed 5% of everything
mentioning me overall thankfully.
Cheers,
Niall